Tuesday, August 3, 2010

Pooches: Two Sick Pitties in the City

In the past two weeks, we have had the pleasure to wake up several times to vomit and diarrhea. The latest incident happened two nights ago with the sound of Mr. B dry heaving and eventually vomiting right by our bed. Then the next morning we find a nice pile of diarrhea on the runner of our front door. A few days earlier, Ms. M had explosive diarrhea, but luckily they

were all on our walks.

Even Wilma was sick for a day with diarrhea and vomiting and unlucky for us, hers all occurred in the house.We first thought that there was something aerosol or in their water that was making them sick, but through some deductive reasoning we narrowed it down to the treats in their Kongs. Even though our dogs were strays at one point, they have really sensitive stomachs. We wonder what they ate on the streets with their delicate digestive system. Anyway, our cure for their upset stomachs has been to give them Tylan powder with peanut butter. Recently we gave the pooches tripe as recommended by a dog store owner, which seemed to soothe their stomach a bit. In the past, our vet has recommended the rice porridge with boiled chicken, but Mr. B is such a picky eater that he will spend the whole time pushing the rice around to only eat the shredded chicken. We were wondering what methods you recommend to treat an upset stomach.

39 comments:

I am so sorry to hear about the pups :( Fred will not eat the rice either so I will boil chicken and mash white potatos together with some chicken broth and he will gobble it right up. oatmeal, canned pumkin can be added as well. I feed half of what Fred would normally eat during these episodes.

Aloe vera is also very good on their stomachs when having issues for an herbal approach.

I also give them some honey - which can help bring their blood sugar up - Fred will get dehydrated when he is going through a volmit spell so I give him a tad of honey and he licks it right up.

and if all else fails - I give pepto bismol - and it worked on Fred, my vet suggested it.

Fred was rescued and starved the first few months of his life and his stomach is extremely sensitive :(

Poor Pitties! I hardly ever ever gets the sickies but Brudder Ranger does sometimes. Mom usually gives us pepto-bismol (the pill form cuz she tried the liquid form with Ranger one time and just ended up with a pink rat terrier). She also does the rice and chicken thing. Oh, and Mom says maybe if you boil the chicken and then boil the rice in the water you boiled the chicken in, Mr. B might like it better.

So sorry to hear the pooches have been sick. I know for diarrhea rice is recommended as a binder and rice plus chicken when their tummies are upset. Other than not feeding them their normal amounts of food to give their stomachs a chance to settle down, I don't know what else to recommend. Do make sure they have plenty of water though to prevent dehydration.

Poor pups! It's never fun dealing with the sickness! Boiled rice has always worked for us. I don't even use chicken. I've also used cottage cheese mixed in with the rice and that seems to go over well. Hope they all get to feeling better soon!

Canned pumpkin (or sweet potato) are my go-tos for upset tummies - two or three tablespoons on top of the food usually does the trick. I've never had a digestive upset that was bad enough, but boiled chicken and rice is another tried and true remedy - someone else mentioned this too, but if you put it in a food processor or blender before serving, then usually it's homogeneous enough that even picky pups will gobble it up.

Tsar and Noah both have sensitive tummies and now that Samba is so sick, we have to be careful with her. They each get Metronidazole each morning.

When diarrhea or vomiting occur, I withhold food for 24 hours to give the stomach time to relax, then feed either rice with boiled chicken or rice with boiled ground beef for a day. The next day I add some of their regular food to the rice mixture and by the third day all is well again.

Immediately after a session of stomach upset or after taking antibiotics, they get a course of Probiacin to reseed the gut with beneficial bacteria.

Not fun! Wilbur had diarrhea when we were away for 2 weeks (probably stress). He also had a huge explosive attack on the first night of our boat trip! I'm happy though to see all the suggestions from everyone as I really didn't know what I should do. I hope your pitties feel better and poor Wilma, she always looks so worried.

poor pups! i'm sorry they've been sick. it is not fun cleaning up after them either. :(fortunately, asa and booker do not get sick very often, but when they are feeling under the weather, i give them boiled chicken and rice or canned pumpkin.

:( poor pups!Darwin will usually get rice and chicken with a scoop of canned pumpkin when she's having stomach issues. We've taken to making sure we have at least one can of pumpkin in the house just in case. Hope you can find something gentle on their stomachs!

Pitties are known for their sensitive stomaches- when Kayloo is sick (pittie x, she has bouts all the time):

We cut her food down by 1/2. If that doesn't work we take her off her normal food and give her bland, bland food: rice with a bit of chicken & mashed pumpkin (you get it in a can- get *only* pumpkin, not the stuff with sugar). My dogs don't do well with peanut butter, but if you're going to give it to them I would suggest the natural stuff (regular peanut butter has lots of sugar etc).

Daisy also has a sensitive tummy, and usually I know in advance by hearing her tummy start making growling noises. I give her a pepcid (in pill form) at the first start of this. She usually just refuses to eat anything when she isn't feeling well, but pumpkin is supposed to be the cure all for both diarrhea and constipation, I used it sucessfully daily to keep Sprocket (RIP) from having problems in his old age.

As others have stated, our dog usually simply won't eat if she's not feeling well, which tells us that she's probably going to vomit soon after. Bur usually that's in the morning before breakfast and she's rarely been sick due to something she's eaten. Recently though, she's had some chronic issues with stomach growling (as Daisydog described!) in the mornings and not wanting to eat/vomiting, so at the advice of our vet, we've been giving her a small dose of Pepcid every night before bed. It actually seems to have worked since she hasn't had an issue since! The Pepcid might help also in the case of upset stomach with vomiting and diarrhea, and hopefully avoid the worst of it anyway :)

We feed Levi boiled chicken and white rice, but he'd eat anything, even if he's sick. If I think it's just a passing thing, I'll feed Levi half the usual amount until his stools are normal. It's always been resolved quickly, so I haven't had to hold out too long.

He did have diarrhea and vomiting last week and we figured out it was due to the new brand of PB we put in his Kong. Luckily, my husband has cleaned up all the puke and barf around our house, another reason I love him so much.

We just go very bland when that happens. I don't have a terribly sensitive stomach, at least when it comes to the things my humans allow me to eat. Franklin seems not to be able to tolerate beef so he's not getting that at all. But Blog Mom had a boxer/lab mix with a very sensitive tummy years ago and boiled chicken and rice would work, but she wouldn't really eat the rice much.

AW~ I certainly hope everyone feels better soon. That last picture was so sweet.

Anakin, (also rescue) has a such a sensitive tummy. We went to a Pug meet up once and he ate the same food the girl at and got violently ill.He needed to be rushed to ER and have fluids injected in his neck.

When he gets sick like that..(he seems to be the only one)we give him ground turkey and rice.Very small amounts.

Well, I can't recommend much more than what others have said. It is always worriesome that all three dogs are sick (I recently had three of my horses become sick - we pinpointed a bad weed in the hay. It blended in so well we missed it during our check!).

Aww! sorry to hear about the sick pups! (x3 must be rough!) zeus was sick last week too! rice and chicken work for him for 1 day, then no good. I have yet to try pumpkin or cottage cheese. He has a super sensitive stomach - which is new for me. Our family lab growing up had an iron stomach - he ate anything and everything passed right through - even stuff that should not have made it!

hopefully they are feeling better now...that's a lot of poop and vomit to clean up! we always go the chicken and rice route, because I've never been able to find canned pumpkin in the market unless it's around Thanksgiving!

Sorry to hear everyone has been sick. I have had my share of stomach issues. My mom usually takes me off everything (except water) until the diarrhea and vomiting have ended. Once everything has passed, I have a little white rice with chicken broth for a few days and then slowly start back on regular foods.

Poor babies! You can try probiotics after a period of fasting. A 24 hr period should do the trick. Then start a nice bland diet - bioled chicken and rice maybe? slowly introduced. Small, frequent meals. If not better, off to the vet! Good luck!